I am a skier and today i tried out snowboarding. My friend broke his arm when he fell so that's kinda making me scared to fall so now i have a fear of going fast i am terrified to even get off the bunny hill so any tips would be helpful.

I am a skier and today i tried out snowboarding. My friend broke his arm when he fell so that's kinda making me scared to fall so now i have a fear of going fast i am terrified to even get off the bunny hill so any tips would be helpful.

As mentioned, it's all about learning to fall properly and safely and staying within a 'safe-ish' margin of risk.

There are two main golden rules to remember when falling while snowboarding:

Rule 1) Don't stick your hands out in front or behind you to break your fall. Your natural reaction is to do this, but with snowboarding you have to train yourself to stop doing it.

Things like wrist fractures, dislocations etc tend to happen a lot more because people stick their hands out and the force of impact bends their arms in ways it's not meant to bend.

It's much safer to take the impact with everything tucked in and close to your body when you fall and just let your whole body take the fall instead of trying to break your fall with your hands.

So for example, if you fall forwards, you'd want to keep your hands and arms tucked up against your chest and fall with your forearms braced against your chest instead of falling onto your hands/wrists like you'd normally want to do. Instead of falling onto your wrist, then you'd be falling onto your braced forearms and chest, which is a lot less risky.

Rule 2) Go with the fall.

With most falls, the best idea is to go with the fall. What I mean by this is you don't want to fight against whatever direction you're falling and try to stop suddenly, instead you want to just tuck your arms in and let your body go with the fall and let the force get absorbed by the slope as you slide down the snow.

This is why you'll notice if you watch advanced riders in the park falling on jumps or even just on normal runs they'll just relax and slide down the landing before getting back up if they fall. They don't fight against the fall because most times it's better to just let the slope and snow absorb the impact instead of trying to fight it and breaking an arm in the process.

....at the risk of scaring the skier even further, ...and possibly jacking the thread. It occurred to me to ask if when falling "properly." Has anyone else ever had any trouble with whiplash type issues afterward?

I've noticed on a few occasions after some fairly hard slams, that for the next few days I can sometimes experience a fair amount of pain in the muscles in and around my neck. Specifically the sides of my neck or even down into/around my collar bone and the upper part of my sternum. Both with, or without having hit my my head.

I attributed this to tensing up and trying to keep my helmeted melon from smacking the hardpack. Anyone else had this problem? (....or am I just likely carrying around a big assed pumkin' perched on a "bendy straw?") lol!

I was wondering about this because when falling properly, with extremities tucked in close. I would think the head and neck have a higher probability of being whipped/snapped one way or t'uther as the upper body hits the ground! I assume it's probably worse/more likely to occur like this while wearing a helmet due to the extra weight my neck is trying to support/steady in a fall?

Any thoughts?

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....at the risk of scaring the skier even further, ...and possibly jacking the thread. It occurred to me to ask if when falling "properly." Has anyone else ever had any trouble with whiplash type issues afterward?

I've noticed on a few occasions after some fairly hard slams, that for the next few days I can sometimes experience a fair amount of pain in the muscles in and around my neck. Specifically the sides of my neck or even down into/around my collar bone and the upper part of my sternum. Both with, or without having hit my my head.

I attributed this to tensing up and trying to keep my helmeted melon from smacking the hardpack. Anyone else had this problem? (....or am I just likely carrying around a big assed pumkin' perched on a "bendy straw?") lol!

I was wondering about this because when falling properly, with extremities tucked in close. I would think the head and neck have a higher probability of being whipped/snapped one way or t'uther as the upper body hits the ground! I assume it's probably worse/more likely to occur like this while wearing a helmet due to the extra weight my neck is trying to support/steady in a fall?

Any thoughts?

Been there, done that. Both with or without hitting my head. I guess it's the helmet that makes it even harder for the muscles. Anyway, better having a helmet and a sore neck than no helmet and a cracked skull

Every sport has its own risks. Sure, snowboarding may be a little more extreme than other sports, but if you take the precautions mentioned above, you'll have much less of a risk of injury.

When it comes to going too fast, I suggest trying some slopes falling-leaf style, until you get comfortable, and you can judge the steepness of the slope. And if you should decide that it's too much and that freeriding isn't for you just yet, maybe try your hand in the park with some beginner moves. It can be just as fun.

Just take baby steps if you need to, and try not to let your fears keep you from having a great time snowboarding, because it can really be a lot of fun!!

This. You're gonna fall. I don't care how good you get, you're still gonna go down occasionally if you're pushing yourself and having fun.

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